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> I consider it deeply offensive and am baffled that anyone would consider it germane in 2010. What exactly do you find "deeply offensive"? Because I think yo

by shasta 16y ago

> I consider it deeply offensive and am baffled that anyone would consider it germane in 2010. What exactly do you find "deeply offensive"? Because I think your tone isn't helping your cause. If you wish to argue that race and/or genetics are not significantly correlated with innate ability, please feel free to do so. If this is an established fact that you can document, I would love to see links to research supporting that position (your citations establishing certain biases are much weaker). Your righteous indignation that someone would even bring this up (in 2010!!) is anti-intellectual and needs to go. In my opinion, based mostly on common sense (and racism, no doubt you will claim), I don't think any of the assorted biases you cite are a major cause of performance differences. My intuition is that the major causes are much less subtle: genetics and family life (particularly early family life). I do agree that there is likely a snowball effect that causes early labels of "not good at school" to compound. BTW. Your citation [4] looks deeply suspicious. Asking them to check which race they are cut performance in half? HALF? As in, they were able to, on average, supply 50% fewer correct answers if asked to check a box indicating their race?

halostatue 16y ago
I find it deeply offensive that anyone would take what amounts to eugenic nonsense seriously. If we've learned anything about genetics in the last decade of having the genome decoded, it's that we don't understand squat about how intelligence comes from genetic factors. I don't have a cause here, by the way. I am not arguing a negative; it is up to the folks who which to establish a significant correlation to make their case. So far, all of the indicators are against them (genetics per se seems not to play a major role in success later in life). You may think that the biases that I cite aren't major causes of performance differences, but that's no different than you saying that you think that green tea tastes good. I may think that they're major causes, but that's no different than me saying that black tea is better. What I know is that there are studies out there that indicate that there are many factors much stronger than genetics will ever be for success. The top of these is, by the way, family life. These are measurable more in the negative than the positive: children of alcoholics and drug addicts tend to do worse in school than those with non-addicted parents; children of broken homes tend to do worse in school than those with unified families. One of the major positive correlations is reading: children whose family reads, even if they don't read together, tend to perform better in school than those who don't. What families read, especially together? Those who don't have to spend a lot of time working to make ends meet and put food on the table. You may think that [4] is suspicious, but I've heard about this study a few times and I believe that it has been corroborated by other studies. Yeah, it's surprising, but that doesn't make it wrong. Again, step to Gladwell for a second and look at what Korean Air found out. When the subconscious social status indicators happened in language, accidents were more likely to happen. As soon as the entire cockpit switched to an informal English, accident rates dropped dramatically. So yes, reminding someone of their "social place" can significantly reduce their performance.

by shasta 16y ago

halostatue 16y ago

I find it deeply offensive that anyone would take what amounts to eugenic nonsense seriously. If we've learned anything about genetics in the last decade of having the genome decoded, it's that we don't understand squat about how intelligence comes from genetic factors. I don't have a cause here, by the way. I am not arguing a negative; it is up to the folks who which to establish a significant correlation to make their case. So far, all of the indicators are against them (genetics per se seems not to play a major role in success later in life). You may think that the biases that I cite aren't major causes of performance differences, but that's no different than you saying that you think that green tea tastes good. I may think that they're major causes, but that's no different than me saying that black tea is better. What I know is that there are studies out there that indicate that there are many factors much stronger than genetics will ever be for success. The top of these is, by the way, family life. These are measurable more in the negative than the positive: children of alcoholics and drug addicts tend to do worse in school than those with non-addicted parents; children of broken homes tend to do worse in school than those with unified families. One of the major positive correlations is reading: children whose family reads, even if they don't read together, tend to perform better in school than those who don't. What families read, especially together? Those who don't have to spend a lot of time working to make ends meet and put food on the table. You may think that [4] is suspicious, but I've heard about this study a few times and I believe that it has been corroborated by other studies. Yeah, it's surprising, but that doesn't make it wrong. Again, step to Gladwell for a second and look at what Korean Air found out. When the subconscious social status indicators happened in language, accidents were more likely to happen. As soon as the entire cockpit switched to an informal English, accident rates dropped dramatically. So yes, reminding someone of their "social place" can significantly reduce their performance.